The Wild Ruthvens. A home story

Front matter

THE WILD RUTHVENS Nancie was seated on her favourite little stool, beside Dick's couch. (Page 9s.) THE WILD RUTHVENS. & gome Story. BY CURTIS YORKE, Author of "Hush!" "Dudley," "The Brown Portmanteau, " That Little Girl," &c. "Thou would'st be Hero? Wait not then supinely For fields of fine romance which no day brings ; The finest life lies oft in doing finely A multitude of unromantic things. The heroism of thy true endeavour Shall gild the commonplace of common days, And God Himself shall guard thy work for ever, And crown it with eternity of praise." LONDON: JARROLD Si SONS, 3, PATERNOSTER BUILDINGS, E.C. 1889. [All fiighls Reserved.] CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. WHICH INTRODUCES THE FAMILY ... 9 II. IN WHICH THE BOYS BEHAVE BADLY ... 24 III. SHOWING HOW AGATHA HAD ASPIRATIONS ... 32 IV. POOR DICK .. ... ... ... 42 V. IN WHICH NANCIE FINDS A FRIEND ... 47 VI.

ODDS AND ENDS ... ... ... 61 VII. THE NEW SCHOLAR ... ... ... 71 VIII. KITTY SURPRISES HER FAMILY ... ... 89 IX. CHRISTMAS ... ... ... ... IOI X. ROY DISTINGUISHES HIMSELF ... ... 1 13 XI. TED ... ... ... ... 129 XII. TED LEARNS A SOLDIER'S FIRST LESSON ... 1 39 XIII. MR. CHARTERIS ... ... ... 1 46 XIV. THE RUTHVENS AT THEIR WORST ... 1 54 XV. CHARTERIS IN A NEW CHARACTER, AND DICK IN AN OLD ONE ... ... ... 168 XVI. A HEAVY TROUBLE ... ... ... 1 83 XVII. IN WHICH MR. LESTER RESIGNS ... ... CONTENTS. VIII CHAPTER PAGE XVIII. THE STORY GAME ... ... ... 207 XIX. A TINY SOCRATES ... ... ... 231 XX. A PAINFUL EXPERIENCE ... ... 240 XXI. TREATING PRINCIPALLY OF DISAGREEABLES 248 XXII. A SURPRISE PARTY ... ... 262 XXIII. DICK'S DARK HOUR ... ... ... 276 XXIV. A DISASTER AND AN ARMISTICE ... 285 XXV.

THE COMING SHADOW ... ... ... 294 XXVI. THOSE THAT WERE LEFT ... ... 304 XXVII. "AFTER MANY DAYS " . . . ... ... 313 XXVIII. IN WHICH DICK CLAIMS A PROMISE ... THE WILD RUTHVENS. 31 Ssoxne §?forj?.

Chapter I. Which Introduces The Family

' ' A boy is the most difficult to manage of all wild beasts." Plato. The wild Ruthvens ! So the county called them ; and in truth the name suited them ; for a wilder, more grace less lot of young people surely never were collected under one roof before nor since. They were orphans, for their father had died four years ago, just before Baby May was born, and their mother had only survived him a few weeks. The household was ruled nominally by an elder sister of the late Major Ruthven's, but the Ruthvens themselves were ruled by no man or woman living. They had a faint respect, perhaps, for the commands of Uncle John, their mother's brother, on the comparatively few occasions when he visited Ruthven Court ; but his THE WLLD RUTHVENS. 10 influence vanished with his presence, and his lawless nephews and nieces set conventionality and the world's opinion at defiance.

Uncle John, by the way (otherwise Mr. John Dornton), was a prosperous Manchester cotton spinner ; he was also the children's guardian. On the early autumn evening upon which this story opens, the family were assembled in the schoolroom at the Court. It was a fine old building, Ruthven Court, picturesque to a degree, and standing on a richly-wooded slope facing the river Kern in Buckinghamshire. Its picturesqueness, however, told, better at a distance, being in fact the picturesqueness of gradual decay. For the Ruthvens were poor — " degradingly poor," as the eldest daughter, blue-eyed, brown-haired Agatha said — " beastly poor," as the boys put it. And it required all Aunt Prue's good management to make both ends meet, even as far as such absolute necessaries as food and clothing went. Indeed if it hadn't been for Uncle John, I don't know how she could have managed at all.

Certainly there was no margin for improvements or repairs as regarded the house itself. The family numbered eight, three boys and five girls ; and as they were all present on this particular evening, I shall leave them to introduce themselves and their various idiosyncrasies. For a wonder, they were not all talking at once. Agatha, the eldest, who was eighteen, and therefore a shade more decorous in her behaviour JVHLCH INTRODUCES THE FAMILY. 11 than the rest of them, was seated on the window-seat, rapidly, and with doubtful neatness, sewing up a rent in her blue serge gown. The others were spread about the room variously. Kitty, who was a year younger than Agatha, and decidedly the beauty of the family, was slowly rocking herself backwards and forwards in a large old-fashioned rocking-chair.

She had lovely dark blue eyes, a clear pink and white skin, thick wavy black hair, and a singularly sweet expression. " I wonder if he'll be nice," she was saying in answer to some remark of Agatha's. " You wonder if who'll be nice ? " said a voice — a boy's voice — from under the table. "Cousin Dick," answered Kitty. " He's coming next week." "What! to stay?" continued the hidden voice, which was now supplemented by a very untidy head of light brown hair, surmounting a youthful body clad in a much-worn grey tweed jacket and knickerbockers. " We don't want any more boys," here put in twelve year-old Nancie, gloomily. She was seated on the hearthrug with Baby May upon her lap. Poor Nancie ! She was a kind of little Pariah in the family, for she was cursed with a most violent and un governable temper — not that any of them were much to boast of in that way.

She was a plain, dark-eyed little creature, with a rather forbidding expression, and a THE WILD RUTHVENS. 12 hungry loving little soul that, as yet, had never been satisfied. Her one comfort was Baby May, whom she adored, and by whom she was adored in return. "Don't want any more boys," echoed Baby May, shaking her fair curly head. " Only want Roy, and Ted, and Joe." "Cousin Dick isn't a boy," said a plump little girl of ten, who was nursing Oliver Twist (a much-enduring black and white kitten) in a corner of the shabby but comfortable sofa. " He's quite grown-up, because I asked Aunt Prue." Here two boys, who had been having a half-laughing, but determined tussle in a distant corner for possession of a stuffed parrot (which now remained in the victor's hand, minus its head and tail) took simultaneous flying leaps over the table, and precipitated themselves bodily upon Joe, who had emerged from his retreat, and now lay calmly on his back, with his arms folded under his head.

" Who is quite grown up ? " asked Roy, the eldest and successful competitor for the parrot. He was a fine dark-eyed, dark-haired boy of about fifteen, as like his sister Kitty as he could well be, except that he was not nearly so handsome. " Cousin Dick," said Agatha, laying down her thimble with an air of relief. " He's coming to board with us." " To board with us ? " repeated Joe, half-raising himself from his recumbent position. " What's that ? We're more likely to be bored with him, I should say ! " (Joe had a small reputation for wit in the family, and strained it to the utmost.) " Well, you know," said Agatha doubtfully, " I fancy it means that as we are not very well off, and as he is well off, and is ill, and all alone at that great house of his in Lancashire — " " It means," put in Kitty, with an air of decision, as Agatha paused, " that he is going to pay us handsomely for living here, and that we shall be better off than ever we were before.

And I'm sure," emphatically, " that'll be a good thing. Aunt Prue told us to-day, while you boys were doing your lessons with Mr. Lester. She had a letter from Uncle John, and he's coming either to night or to-morrow to talk it over." " Well, I'm sure I hope you boys will behave better than you generally do," observed Agatha, " or he'll think he's been sent to a lunatic asylum — cousin Dick I mean." " We'll just behave as we always do," said Roy doggedly, as he leaned his broad young shoulders against the mantelpiece, "and if he doesn't like it — why, he can do the other thing." " It's a beastly shame of Uncle John," put in Ted, who was a year younger than Roy, and delightfully ugly, with an honest manly kind of ugliness which in its way THE WLLD RUTHVENS. 14 was almost as attractive as beauty—" a beastly shame.

Sending the fellow to stick himself down here, making a nuisance of himself, and very likely bossing the whole show. A fellow we've never seen before either — though he is our cousin." " I don't think he'll do much ' bossing,' poor fellow," said Kitty, very soberly, " because he is quite an invalid, Aunt Prue says, and has to lie on the sofa all day." " Lie on the sofa all day ! He must be a jolly muff," chimed in Joe, who in all his thirteen years had hardly ever had a day's illness, though his pale sharp features and great shining eyes invested his appearance with an interesting delicacy. " He's a cripple ! " said the little girl upon the sofa. Her real name was Ida, but she had long ago been christened "Blinks" by her brothers, because of a habit she had of winking her eyes very fast when she spoke.

" A cripple ? " echoed the boys in various accents of disgust. " Oh, I say ! " " Yes," went on Blinks with relish, " and Auntie says he has to be carried about from one room to another, and—" " Be quiet, Blinks," said Agatha. " A cripple ! " said Joe again. " Has he no legs — or what ? " " No legs — poor boy ! " said Baby May, shaking her head compassionately, and surveying her own sturdy little limbs with calm satisfaction " Oh yes, he has legs, of course? said Kitty hastily ; " but he really is quite helpless. You know he was thrown from his horse six months ago, and injured his spine so dreadfully that the doctors say he can never recover." " I'd rather have been killed outright," muttered Roy. " So should I," assented Ted. " And I say," he added, "who's going to carry him about from one room to another, if he can't walk ?

Us, I suppose." " Oh no, he will bring his own servant," said Agatha. " And I'm going to take him his breakfast in the mornings," observed Blinks in an important voice. " I asked Aunt Prue if I might, and she said yes — " But here Blinks broke off with a piercing yell, for Joe, undu lating stealthily towards her in the twilight, gave such a severe tweak to poor Oliver Twist's tail, that that justly exasperated animal not only scratched Blinks severely, but in the most vicious manner jumped down and scratched Baby May as well. Whereupon Blinks fell upon Joe literally " tooth and nail," while Nancie, furious at the great red scratch upon her darling Baby May's arm, flew to revenge her by banging the unrepentant Joe upon the shoulders with the hearthbrush. " I say, Nancie, stop that, will you !

" shouted Joe fiercely, feeling, doubtless, that " two to one was not fair." But in another moment Nancie was caught up by THE WILD RUTHVENS. Roy and Ted, and deposited, screaming and struggling, in the middle of the large table, to be pushed to and fro from one to the other upon its leather-covered surface, until she burst into passionate shrieks and sobs. Kitty (who, as Agatha often said, would countenance the boys in all their mad pranks, and indeed at times was as bad as any of them) cried out between bursts of half unwilling laughter, " Boys — boys — it is really too bad ! " But in the twinkling of an eye, she found herself perched on the top of a moderately high bookcase (frequently in use for penances of this sort) where, laughing and expostulating, she perforce had to remain until assistance should arrive.

Meanwhile Nancie, who had rushed from the room and got half-way upstairs, was captured and brought back to endure the further indignity of being held prisoner by Ted, while Roy decorated her face with tasteful little blobs of ink, and tied her long hair into a series of tight hard knots. " Now boys," said Agatha, her pretty face quite distressed, " I will not have this. I forbid you to tease Nancie so." " Oh, Spitfire can stand up for herself, Madam Agatha, so don't you interfere," said Roy, making a sudden grab at the skirt of the speaker's dress with one hand, while he held Nancie's wrists with the other. Agatha sprang aside ; but alas ! the unhappy serge gown, which had not been mended with a view to sustaining such attacks, gave way suddenly, and a goodly part of the flounce " came away " in Roy's hand.

This, and the unholy joy of the offender, was too much for Agatha, who as a rule was the sweetest-tempered of them all. Her small pale face crimsoned suddenly, and with flashing eyes she administered to the offender a sound and wholesome box on the ear. He stepped back hurriedly, tramped upon poor little Baby May's fingers, tripped over her small body, and nearly fell into the fire-place. The next moment he flew at the somewhat conscience stricken Agatha, and shook her so violently that her very teeth seemed to rattle in her head. Nancie, driven to frenzy by Baby May's piteous cries, bit Ted's hand so viciously that with an indignant howl he let her go. At this moment the door opened, and Miss Ruthven, otherwise " Aunt Prue" entered the room. Dear, gentle, loving Aunt Prue ! with her soft brown hair streaked with grey, her still youthful heart, and her beautiful blue eyes.

They all adored her, these wild nephews and nieces of hers, and would, I believe, have laid down their lives for her any day ; but as for obeying her — or recognising her authority in any way — why, they would simply have shouted at the idea. B THE WLLD RUTHVENS. 18 She raised her hand imploringly as she stood in the doorway, and her lips were seen to move ; but not a sound could be heard in the appalling din around her. The derisive shouts of the two elder boys, who had again seized the unhappy Nancie ; the shrieks of Nancie and Blinks ; the plaintive wailing of Baby May, mingled with Kitty's vociferous demands to be taken down, and Agatha's vain entreaties for silence, would have drowned a voice possessing treble the power of Aunt Prue's. But all at once there was a lull. Roy and Ted released the struggling and furious Nancie ; Joe and Blinks pushed their hair out of their eyes, and scrambled to their feet ; even Baby May stopped crying and ran towards the door, where just behind Aunt Prue, stood a stout, middle-sized old gentleman, with a handsome genial face, a fierce grey moustache, and kind grey eyes — Uncle John, in fact.

" Now, now, children," cried the new-comer, with a frown which was less awe-inspiring than it ought to have been. " What's all this ? Bless my soul, Nancie, what's the matter with you ? " For Nancie was actually dancing, and almost choking with passion. " I hate you, Roy and Ted ! " shrieked the little fury, her great dark eyes literally blazing. " I hate you both ! I'll be even with you for this — see if I don't. No, I won't be a good girl and hold my tongue, Uncle John ! No, I won't remember I was sorry afterwards the last time, Aunt Prue ! Leave me alone, Agatha — or I'll kick you ! I hate you all ! You're always insulting me, and laughing at me, and making my life miserable ! " " Go it, Nancie ! Two to one on Spitfire ! " shouted Joe, who was standing on his hands, waving his feet aloft in a particularly maddening way.

It was too much for poor Nancie. She caught up an ink-bottle, which by an evil chance lay ready to her hand, and hurled it with all her force at the unsuspecting Ted. It just missed him (which was well, as he turned himself right side up again), and crashed through one of the window-panes into the garden beyond. The next moment Nancie had rushed past Uncle John like a small whirlwind, and thence out of the room and upstairs, where a door was heard to bang violently. There was a short silence, broken only by a giggle from Blinks. Then Uncle John spoke. " Boys, I am ashamed of you ! " he said sternly. " You are a set of unmanly young scoundrels to tease your little sister so. Leave the room, all of you, and prepare for tea. And if I hear any more of this bullying tom-foolery, I'll give you all as sound a thrashing as ever you had in your lives."

The boys left the room, and were subsequently heard giving way to subdued explosions of laughter, as they climbed swiftly upstairs upon all fours, which mode of progression was as natural to them in ascending the staircase, as sliding down the bannisters was in descend ing it. They usually obeyed Uncle John (when he was there to enforce his orders), for one and all knew that his thrashings were something to be remembered. He was a passionate man when thoroughly roused, though usually good-natured to a degree, and the boys had vivid recollections of certain merciless beatings which had made their lives, a burden to them for a considerable time after the administration thereof. However, as these punishments were usually mitigated, so to speak, by some timely, if injudicious " tip " varying from half-a crown to five shillings, it is to be feared their effect was less lasting than could have been wished.

As for the girls they tyrannized over Uncle John to an incredible extent, and I really think he liked it. Baby May was now standing on a footstool at his side, and with calm audacity was searching his pocket for chocolate creams, of which sweetmeat she was inor dinately fond. A box being forthcoming, she demolished half-a-dozen creams at one blow, and demanded to be carried into the dining-room, where presently all the family, with the exception of Nancie, assembled round the tea-table. Kitty, by the way, had been rescued from her airy perch some time ago. As a slight tribute to Uncle John's presence, there was rather less squabbling and reckless hilarity at the table than usual to-night. To be sure Roy playfully dropped a large caterpillar into Kitty's tea, and she in return dropped it down his neck, with the immediate result that the contents of both their tea-cups bedewed the table-cloth.

As it was a clean table-cloth, this was trying to Aunt Prue's soul, and she sighed a silent protest. At this moment the door opened, and Nancie entered, and took her accustomed place between Kitty and Agatha. Her nose and eyes were swollen and very red, her mouth sullen. Altogether at that moment she was not at all a pleasant-looking little girl. " Your nose is twite red, Nancie dear," observed Baby May, cheerfully from her post of observation near the tea-tray. Nancy flushed a dingy crimson, and helped herself to bread and butter. " My eye ! what an object ! " observed Ted, pausing in the act of helping himself to jam, to gaze at his sister open-mouthed. " She's more like a witch than ever ! " Nancie's lips trembled, and two large tears began to meander slowly down her cheeks. "Cry, baby, cry— put your finger in your eye!" chanted Joe provokingly.

At this point Uncle John brought the remarks of these two facetious young men to an abrupt conclusion by rising and administering to each a ringing box on the ear. The delinquents relapsed into sullen silence, and the meal proceeded. As it approached its conclusion Uncle John said, addressing them all collectively, " Now boys and girls, I have to tell you that your cousin Dick Trevanion is coming to — er — to live here ; and I do most earnestly trust that you will all try to behave yourselves, and that — -that in short it may be — in fact, that it may be a mutual benefit and pleasure to — er — to all." Here Uncle John, who did not shine in oratory, took off his glasses, rubbed them diligently, and went on, directing a severe glance towards the boys, " And mind, if I hear of any tricks being played upon the poor fellow, who is as helpless as a baby, I'll — I'll break every bone in your bodies.

As for you, girls, I hope you'll try to cheer the poor fellow up a bit, for his is a sad trial — a very sad trial. Six months ago he was as strong as one of your brothers, and as fine a young fellow as you would wish to see ; and now he is a cripple for life, and — " The speaker stopped suddenly, and blew his nose with violence. " No legs ! " said Baby May, with funny solemnity. " Poor boy ! Baby May will kiss him." Here Blinks choked in her tea, to the undisguised delight of her brothers, and shortly afterwards Uncle John found that he had only a quarter of an hour to walk to the station. He could not stay all night, he said, for he had to be in Manchester early in the morning. Poor Uncle John ! he was much exercised in his WHLCH LNTRODUCES THE FAMILY. 23 mind sometimes regarding his wild nephews and nieces.

He was a quiet, order-loving old bachelor, who lived, and ate, got up, and went to bed, by clockwork ; and to tell the truth, he was not sorry when he left Ruthven Court behind him.

Chapter II. In Which The Boys Behave Badly

" Turning to mirth, all things on earth, As only boyhood can." Mr. Lester, the young Ruthvens' tutor (employed and paid for by kind-hearted Uncle John), was a quiet looking young man of good family and uncertain temper, who came three times a week to instruct these young savages, and whose labours among his unruly pupils were productive of anything but satisfactory results. They learned their lessons or they didn't, just as it happened to suit them ; got respectively thrashed and lectured by Uncle John at intervals, when Mr. Lester wrote a formal complaint to that gentleman ; took their punishment cheerfully, and went on as before. There was a first-class boys' school in the neighbourhood ; but from it the Ruthven boys had been summarily and conclusively expelled six months ago, the head-master refusing to take them back on any pretext, whatever.

Nancie and Blinks attended a select ladies' school about IN WHICH THE BO YS BEHA VE BADE Y. 25 half a mile from the Court. Agatha and Kitty had been, until a year ago, at a boarding-school in Brighton. Mr. Lester used to wonder sometimes if boys existed anywhere else who were so lamentably ignorant. Stupid they certainly were not. Idle, mischievous, and exasperating to the last degree, they certainly were. Besides his labours with these boys, this unhappy young man had undertaken to superintend the preparation of the younger girls' lessons — I mean Nancie and Blinks. Half-an-hour was devoted to the little girls, while the boys wrote exercises (this being, as Mr. Lester had long ago discovered, the only time when they could be got to write them) ; the remaining hour and half was a wretched purgatory to the weary tutor and his boy pupils alike.

I am sorry to say, that the young ladies' behaviour was, as a rule, quite on a par with their brothers'. One day's proceedings will give a very fair example of how the pursuit of learning was followed in the Ruthven family. Nearly a week had passed since Uncle John's visit, and Dick Trevanion was to arrive on the following day. It was a dull afternoon as to weather, very wet, and bitterly cold. Mr. Lester was late ; it was nearly half-past four when he came, instead of four. He was not in his most amiable mood this afternoon, having, for one thing, a severe headache. Unhappily, his pupils, boys and girls alike, seemed disposed to be especially impish and reckless. For perhaps five minutes after Mr. Lester's arrival, the boys were (apparently) absorbed in their French and Latin exercises, while Nancie and Blinks waded through the geography of South America.

Then the usual amenities were exchanged. " I say, Lester, I can't write this thing," said Roy, leaning back in his chair with an extensive yawn. " I don't know what the French idioms for ' turning the cold shoulder,' and 'taking no notice of are, and I don't want to, either." " Go on with your work, sir," said Mr. Lester sharply. " And when you address me, I shall thank you to do so in a more respectful manner." Roy waited until his tutor was again deep in South America, then stealthily slipping a piece of fresh paper over his exercise, he was soon absorbed in a series of thrilling though very badly-executed comic sketches, representing Mr. Lester in various attitudes of abject fear and humiliation, surrounded by singularly anato mized wild beasts, and entitled " The Adventures of Lester among the Cannibals of the Far West."

Ted and Joe, meanwhile, in place of writing out their Latin exercises, were engaged in that absorbing game called, I believe, " The Nine O's." After some time a triumphant "There to there!" from Ted, made Mr. Lester look up. "Are those your exercises, boys?" he said with ominous calm. IN WHICH THE BOYS BEHAVE BADLY. 27 " Not exactly, sir," was the bland reply from Ted. " Are they finished, then ? " " Not quite, sir." " Bring that paper to me, Edward." Ted obeyed with obliging readiness. The paper referred to bore the following lines, besides the fascinating game already mentioned : — " Old Lester is a fool, Thinks he knows enough to set up a school. But we know far more than him Though he looks so wise and so precious grim." Mr. Lester read this exquisite and talented production in silence.

Then he said coldly, " Ah ! It seems a pity that your fancy for verse writing should not be encouraged, Edward ; so you can write out and bring to me to-morrow three pages of Virgil, which I shall mark for you before I leave." "Well, I just won't then," was the blunt answer, "so you needn't trouble yourself!" Mr. Lester flushed a dark red. " Do you mean to say you defy me, sir ? " he said sternly. " I mean to say I'm not going to write out all that rubbish," was the dogged answer. The flush upon Mr. Lester's face faded, leaving it rather white. "Very well, we shall see," he said, controlling his THE WLLD RUTHVENS. voice with difficulty. " Miss Ida," to the giggling Blinks, " attend, if you please. Where is Peru ? " Blinks looked at the ceiling, the floor, and finally out of the window for inspiration ; and at last was heard to mutter something about the borders of the Black Sea.

Mr. Lester drew a long breath. " Did you look over this ? " he said with a resigned air. Blinks moved uneasily in her chair, but did not answer. Her tutor handed her the book in silence, and proceeded to cross-examine Nancie on a portion of English history, during which examination it transpired that Stephen of Blois had come over with the Conqueror in 1066, had married Queen Elizabeth two years later, and subsequently signed Magna Charta in consequence of the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. At this startling sequence of events the boys simultaneously fell from their chairs in fits of laughter ; and Nancie, in a sudden paroxysm of rage, was just about to rush from the room, when the door opened and Kitty entered. Mr. Lester thought he had never seen her look so sweet. Poor man, I daresay it was a welcome relief for his eyes to rest upon her lovely face and graceful figure, after the sullen or giggling countenances, and not too tidy toilettes of his unmanageable pupils.

He rose and shook hands. Kitty noticed at once the IN WHICH THE BOYS BEHAVE BADLY. 29 tired harassed look in his eyes, and said sympathetically (for she had vivid recollections of assisting the boys to prepare their lessons before their abrupt dismissal from St. Ann's), " Have they been worse than usual to-day, Mr. Lester ? " Mr. Lester raised his eyebrows in eloquent silence. " Auntie sent me to ask you," went on Kitty, with a reproving shake of her head towards the boys, which was received by these reprobates with open derision, " if you will kindly allow the boys to have a holiday to-morrow, as our cousin is coming, and — " But she was interrupted by an avalanche of boys, who almost smothered her with bear-like caresses. "Sweet Kitty, pretty Kitty, darling Kitty!" they shouted in concert.